Red
by Metonomia
Summary: “Her face was white – not merely pale, but white like snow or paper or icing-sugar, except for her very red mouth.” Edmund overcomes his fear. Written for AsCast's Summer Challenge: Color.


The first time Susan's Dryad ladies persuaded her to use a lip-color was the first night Edmund returned to the Witch's sledge in his dreams.

He scarcely noticed it during the evening's intimate dinner party – as small as a Court function could be, with only three Ambassadors and their wives, four Royal Advisors, and a handful of other various Important Persons. On Susan, whose warm skin and soft eyes could never inspire memories of Jadis, the red was cheery and bright as the heart of a fire, and Edmund would not have even seen it but for the fact that he was trying rather harder in Narnia to look at his siblings face-on than he had in Spare Oom.

Later though, the red-stained mouth became all his mind could see, and the color developed a frosty edge the moment it entered his dream. He sat wrapped in the hem of a white fur coat, and at first her face was transparent enough that he could see the winter-wrapped landscape blurring in the wake of the sleigh.

"Why Edmund, darling, it has been far too long!"

The dream-Witch solidified abruptly, and he watched in horrified fascination as the paper-white face was suddenly marred by those blood-red lips. He could not speak; could not even scream the fear that rose up in his mind with her appearance.

"Edmund." Her voice sharpened and clarified to the tone he remembered well from her stone courtyard and the long trek towards the Stone Table. "You will always be mine. Don't forget that."

She said no more that first night, but the image of her red mouth drifted throughout his mind all night, and he awoke shivering even in the warm summer air.

Two nights later, she appeared again, ready to explain further.

"The magic has been satisfied, little Prince, but your guilty mind has not come to terms with itself."

"I've accepted it – Aslan redeemed me – He said the past is to be learned from, not dwelt upon – " he tried to argue, but the answers that were so easy to believe when recalling the Lion's warm golden fur and eternal eyes seem feeble when he was fixated upon her cold crimson mouth.

"And yet you dwell, Son of Adam. The great flaw of your race is your inability to forgive yourself. For myself, I have never regretted my actions, and so I have never tortured myself, or anyone else, as effectively as you now do." The lips twisted into a cruel smile at his silence, and she again faded away, leaving only the red-tinged image of his own doubt-filled fears.

After that she never spoke again in his dreams, but her very presence spoke volumes. During the day, when he could rationalize the experience, Edmund knew his weakness of faith was giving her a power she could no longer wield, but as fervently as he strove to shore up his belief in the gift Aslan had given him, the moment he saw Jadis' red mouth smirking at him he lost himself to the fear that he would never be more than the traitor who but for the Lion's grace would have ruined Narnia's hope.

When Edmund finally found the courage to speak to his siblings about the dreams, all their most fervent consolations could do nothing. Peter apologized yet again for driving him away back in Spare Oom and said that yes, the near-miss was a bad memory, but nothing more, and the Witch was gone. Susan swore to never color her lips again, which was lovely of her but unnecessary, he said, and reminded him of all the good he was doing for their subjects. Lucy just hugged him with all the considerable amount of loving energy she possessed and said the only thing that came at all close to pulling him away from his depression.

"You know, Aslan will still love you even if you doubt Him, but I think He would be sad to see you so unhappy."

But none of the advice and well-wishing could protect him at night, and he grew steadily more unable to sleep for fear of that red mouth telling him more terrible truths about himself.

He awoke after one particularly trying dream, choking on the acidic taste he had come to associate with the Witch's particular shade of red, and felt something deep inside of him snap.

"Why, Aslan?" he cried into his tangled sheets, exhausted and overcome by the self-loathing Jadis inspired in him. "You forgave me, Peter and the rest forgave me, so why can't I just forget what I did?"

"Because, child, to forget would be to also forget the grace I gave to you." The deep growl, gentler than any tone he had ever heard the Lion use, startled Edmund out of his pained reverie. He tumbled out of bed to collapse before Aslan, burying his head in the soft fur and weeping unashamedly in relief.

"Son of Adam, did you not think I would come if you but asked?" He heard the gentle rebuke in the great voice and sat up, strengthened by the physical presence that proved he had been saved.

"I should have known, Aslan, but it was so hard with her talking at me – she made me forget the truth and only remember my weakness."

"_She_ made you forget, Edmund?"

"No, I suppose it was my own mind . . . Was it very wrong of me to need to see you to fully believe again? Because I know now that I mustn't be so selfish as to assume I'm the only person to ever do something wrong but be forgiven."

"No, Son of Adam, everyone has doubts sometimes, and the demons you have faced are more severe than most. But now – " and the Lion's soft growl rose in volume and force – "you must take courage, Edmund, and keep me with you always. Do not let your memories of the Witch steal the second chance you have received. Life is precious, and you are too much loved to lose yourself to a fear which no longer has any hold upon you. I did not save you merely for you, but for all of Narnia."

Aslan rose and shook out his mane, and as he did so a delicious feeling of peace drifted through Edmund, along with a stronger desire for sleep than he had ever known.

"Now, Son of Adam, sleep, and dream not of the Witch but of how you may use the gift you have been given for the good of all my creation."

Edmund closed his eyes upon the golden image of the Lion, and when he awoke the next day it was to the memory of that blessing instead of the Witch's curse. He was never again enslaved to her in his dreams, but he never could forget completely, and from then on, any moment of fear or doubt was always accompanied by the image of smiling red lips marring a snow-white face.


End file.
